Vikings do hard yards on and off footy field

RUGBY UNION AFTER being forced to withdraw from the FNQ Rugby competition due to a lack of numbers last season, Innisfail Vikings president Kevin Burgess was desperate to see his mates playing footy again in 2018.

The Vikings, captained by forward utility Tamanu Terai, are made up of around 20 passionate rugby union devotees, many of whom work on farms around the region.

So when the club finally took the field at Machans Beach to play a reserve grade match against Barron Trinity Bulls, Burgess said he felt a small sense of pride.

“These guys work so hard on the banana fields all week and then play with real passion on the weekends in the reserve grade,” he said.

“The majority of our guys work really hard to make a dollar and come from big families.

“At the moment, we just want to play and that’s all it’s about. So it’s great to be back.”

The visitors, who intend to play out the season without a coach, lost 25-5 but showed they could be a threat later in the season, Burgess said.

“I don’t think anyone thought we’d score against Barron,” he said.

“I think the boys saw that once we get everything rolling, we’ll be a threat. A lot of our players having been playing for years. The boys will work out their own game plan and it seems to work for us.”

The Vikings have named a new committee and aim to rebuild relationships within the community after a tumultuous 12 months.

“This season the club will be run off fundraising and we’ll honour the responsibilities to our sponsors from last year,” Burgess said.

“It will be very tight budgetwise but we have the right people to do the job. After the collapse, last year, it left a bad taste in some people’s mouth.

“But hopefully, we can represent Innisfail in the right way and do some damage on the field.”

The Vikings will play their first home game of the season against Southside Crusaders this weekend.